Latter Days
by Em Mindelan
Summary: Ah, but baby if all else fails, nothing is ever quite what it seems." A post-Telling, Vaughn POV, second-person fic.


Hey everyone!  
  
Yes, this is yet another fic of mine. It's a standalone, Vaughn POV, second-person fic.   
  
It's based on a spec that **Jillian R./kenyaj** wrote over at Television Without Pity Alias forum in the Vaughn thread on page 152. [Just scroll down a little to find her spectactular post. ]  
  
Basically, it presupposes that Lauren's a double agent working for the Covenant and Sloane, and that Vaughn married her as part of a deep cover mission while working with Jack in order to obtain information on Sydney [who he *did* believe was alive, according to my own specs, anyway] and her location in order to a) retrieve her and b) bring down Sloane and the Covenant. That's pretty much all you need to know - the rest will be explained in the story.  
  
In other words, he married her in order to rescue Syd.   
  
Anyway, if you're confused at all, go read **Jillian**'s spec over at TWoP, she explains it far more eloquently than I do, believe me.   
  
This is a song fic of a sort, but the lyrics of the song [_Latter Days_ by Over the Rhine] don't intrude that much on the story but rather add to the angst [or so I think!]  
  
It's the most haunting and stunning song I think I have ever heard, and it just screams Vaughn to me - especially Vaughn in this scenario.  
  
TITLE: Latter Days  
SUMMARY: "Ah, baby, if all else fails, nothing is ever quite what it seems." Post-Telling, Vaughn POV, second-person.  
RATING: PG/PG-13  
DISCLAIMER: Not mine. All JJ's. But, you know, JJ, if this is how you decide to resolve the triangle, we'll all love you forever.   
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This hasn't been betaed, so all mistakes are my own.  
  
**Latter Days**  
  
You're getting married today.  
  
It's not to the woman you always dreamt of marrying, but that doesn't matter anymore.  
  
This is your penance.  
  
This is your act of redemption.  
  
This is your deal with the devil.  
  
This is your way of saving her.  
  
By giving her up.  
  
This is the only way, you know.  
  
You've spent weeks planning the entire operation, days on end, without eating, drinking, taking a break, planning, planning, planning it all.  
  
You even talked to Irina Derevko about it, about her experiences, about the best way to establish emotional detachment from your subject.  
  
You're not sure whether or not she's the best person to talk to about emotional detachment, but you know that she was the most successful KGB swallow of all time.  
  
You _know_ that this is the only way.  
  
You just wish that saving her didn't require betraying her like this.  
  
She'll be back soon, hopefully, if everything goes to plan, if you can get enough information, if you can find out where she is, if there can be a rescue mission…there are a lot of what ifs involved in this mission, but you know that it will be successful.  
  
It has to be successful.  
  
She has to be saved.  
  
But when she is, you will be married, and she won't be allowed to learn the truth.  
  
But you will be married, and she won't be allowed to learn the truth.  
  
You will have to push her away, make her believe that you don't regret anything.  
  
The sad part is that you won't regret any of it.  
  
You won't regret marrying Lauren in order to save her.  
  
You won't regret lying to her in order to save her.  
  
You won't regret any of it, because you know that in the end it's the only way.  
  
*  
  
It had begun so simply.  
  
She had been an agent under your control.  
  
A CIA file, and a protocol for meetings.  
  
She had been nothing more to you than words on a piece of paper.  
  
Or at very least, that's what she was supposed to be.  
  
She wasn't supposed to be your lover.  
  
She wasn't supposed to be your girlfriend.  
  
She wasn't supposed to be the woman you knew you wanted to spend the rest of your life with.  
  
But she was.  
  
But now you're about to sell your soul, your honour, your sense of self-worth for her.  
  
And so you're thinking that maybe it would have been easier for you both if you had just stayed agent and handler, if you'd never fallen in love.  
  
[_What a beautiful piece of heartache this has all turned out to be._]  
  
Because all that love has brought you, all that your love for her has ever brought you is pain.  
  
But still you come back to her time, and time and time after again, because in between the pain there's joy, and happiness, and the most incredible completeness you've ever felt.  
  
There's still a part of you, though, that wonders how much easier your life would have been if she'd just stayed a case file, a job, an assignment to you.  
  
If you hadn't cared so much.   
  
[_Lord knows we've learned the hard way all about healthy apathy._]  
  
And so you're wondering if maybe protocol wasn't such a dirty word after all, that maybe a 'healthy detachment' was the best way after all.  
  
That maybe there was a reason why agents and handlers weren't supposed to fall in love.  
  
But you had fallen for her, fallen hard and fast and forever.  
  
[_What a beautiful piece of heartache this has all turned out to be._]  
  
*  
  
You say your vows confidently, clearly, so that there can be no doubt that you mean what you're saying.  
  
Because the entire success of this operation is making Lauren and _them_ [and _her_] believe that you love Lauren.  
  
That you mean what you say when you say these vows.  
  
That you have moved on.  
  
That you swear these vows in good faith.  
  
Because you do, in a way.  
  
You swear to honor and love and cherish another in the faith that saying them will get her back.  
  
And there's even a part of you that looks across at your new wife and sees a woman with brown hair.  
  
That's the part of you which still hears her talk back to you.  
  
So you say your vows.  
  
And you don't regret saying them.  
  
[_And I use these words pretty loosely._]  
  
*  
  
All that you hope is that when she returns, when she sees you married and moved on…all you hope is that she sees past the words that you say, the words that she hears, that she sees past the lies and looks into your eyes.  
  
That she can see the pain and emptiness and hollowness and the way in which you are selling yourself for her.  
  
The way that you have taken on the role of the woman that you've hated as long as you've known the truth about her.  
  
The way in which you are doing the same thing as her mother did.  
  
But what you're doing is nowhere near as noble as what Irina Derevko did, is it?  
  
Irina, at very least, sold herself for her country.  
  
You're doing it for a single woman.  
  
And Irina, you believe, loved her husband.  
  
You don't love your wife.  
  
You think she's a traitor to your country.   
  
You think that she's working with Sloane.  
  
You think that she's betrayed everything and everyone that you hold dear.  
  
And that's why you're married to a woman you don't love.  
  
That's why when she returns, you will be married to someone else.  
  
That's why she'll have to accept that you're lying to her.  
  
That's why she'll have realise that your words are not the truth.  
  
That your words cannot possibly be the truth.  
  
That the truth is held in your eyes, in their emptiness and pain and hollow, crushing, aching heartbreak.  
  
Your words are not the truth.  
  
She will have to learn this.  
  
[_There's so much more to life than words._]  
  
*  
  
You don't know what she's going to say when she finds out what you've done.  
  
When she realises that you haven't moved on.  
  
That you've sacrificed everything for her.  
  
Your honour.  
  
Your pride.  
  
Your morals.  
  
Your sense of self-worth.  
  
The knowledge that your word means something.  
  
You're not the man you were when she left.  
  
You're not the man she knows.  
  
And there's a part of you that thinks that she'll be horrified by the man she finds.  
  
That she'll want nothing to do with someone as amoral as you have become.  
  
Because you are nothing like the man she fell in love with.  
  
You're his ghost, a pale imitation of a once-good, once-true, once-honest man.  
  
A better man than you'll ever be.  
  
And you can just hope that maybe she'll love you half as much as she loved him.  
  
[_There is a me you would not recognize, dear. Call it the shadow of myself._]  
  
*  
  
There's a part of you that knows that you may never see her alive again.  
  
That this mission could take your life.  
  
But in a way it already has.  
  
It has consumed your life, consumed the person that you were.  
  
The man you were is dead.  
  
He died when she did, in a way.  
  
Because in a very real way she's as dead as the man you were is.   
  
You've seen the footage her father has, of her killing a man, slitting his throat in cold blood.  
  
You know that you might die before you see her again in this life.  
  
But somehow you think that when you die, she'll be there. Because she is your angel, and wherever she is is surely heaven.  
  
And you know when you die, the man you once were and the woman she once was will be together.   
  
You don't quite know what will happen to the man you have become, or the woman she is now, but you don't really care anymore.  
  
Your life is worth nothing compared to what his was once worth.  
  
Because there is no value in your life, nothing good anymore.  
  
And even when she returns, she'll be out of your grasp.  
  
Because that's the deal. You can have her back, but then you can't have her at all, not until the mission's over.  
  
That's the deal you have with Jack. You help him find her, save her, by selling your heart to another woman in the hope that she'll possess enough information to locate the woman you love.  
  
You help him.  
  
And then they'll get her out, bring her back.  
  
But you can't get out of the rest of the deal.  
  
You can't opt out halfway through it, when she returns.  
  
_No._   
  
That would be entirely too easy, too quick, and there would be too little pain for anything involving you these days.  
  
No, you are in this to the end.  
  
That was Jack's condition for letting you get involved.  
  
You weren't allowed out. Not until it was all over.  
  
Not until Sloane was dead, the Covenant gone, and your wife sitting in a jail cell somewhere on charges of treason and espionage.  
  
It's hard, and it's brutal, and you hate what you're doing.  
  
But you know that it's the only way that you can bring down the people who hurt her so much.  
  
And that's all you really care about anymore.  
  
Death doesn't matter to you anymore.   
  
Because she will be waiting for him there.  
  
[_And if the music starts before I get there dance without me. You dance so gracefully._]  
  
*  
  
But you're still alive.   
  
You're still living, you're still breathing.  
  
You're still trying to bring down Sloane, still trying to destroy the people who betrayed her, betrayed you, betrayed your country.  
  
You're still working.  
  
You're still fighting.  
  
And some days you can fool yourself into thinking that that means that you're still all right.  
  
That you're still sane, despite the hell that you have created around you in the last eighteen months.  
  
[_I really think I'll be o.k. They've taken their toll these latter days._]  
  
But the easiest person to lie to is always yourself.  
  
*  
  
It's later that day.  
  
Your wedding is over.  
  
And your new wife, your target, your mission, lies sleeping beside you in the same bed.  
  
It's not a comfortable bed.  
  
Oh, it's a good mattress, sure.   
  
There's nothing wrong with the bed itself.  
  
But it is about as comfortable as sleeping on a bed of nails.  
  
Because this bed of yours is made with betrayal and treachery and deceit and sacrifice and pain.  
  
And it is made with the anguish that comes only from broken dreams.  
  
No matter what happens from here on out – this you know:  
  
You will never have the perfect life.  
  
You will never have the white picket fence, the 2.5 kids, the dogs and the minivan.  
  
This is not something you will ever be allowed, not after what you have done today.  
  
Even years down the track, when Lauren's gone, when maybe she's forgiven you your sins and taken you back…this will still haunt both of you.  
  
You will never have the happy ever after.  
  
This you know, as you lie here on your bed of nails.  
  
There's too much pain for a fairytale ending.  
  
[_Nothing like sleeping on a bed of nails.__ Nothing much here but our broken dreams.]_  
  
*  
  
All you hope now is that she'll believe the truth when you tell her.  
  
Even that maybe she'll be able to see through your lies, your mask, your façade.  
  
She should, you reason.  
  
She's a spy.  
  
Her life is one of lies.  
  
Surely she'll be able to see it when you lie to her, when you tell her that you don't regret moving on, that you love your wife.  
  
Surely she'll know that you'd never betray her in truth.  
  
Surely she'll know.  
  
This is all you hope now.  
  
[_Ah, but baby if all else fails, nothin' is ever quite what it seems._]  
  
*  
  
It's almost exactly one year later when you see her, in a dark and dirty safehouse in Hong Kong.  
  
It's a few days after that when you see her again, and she tells you that she thinks it comes down to faith.  
  
You feel like laughing in her face, and asking her   
  
_what.  
she.  
knows.   
about.  
faith._  
  
You have faith.  
  
You have faith that what you're doing is the best way.  
  
That it's the only way.  
  
But it still kills you inside as you wake up with blonde hair spilling onto your pillow every morning.  
  
It's a week later when you see her again, in your classroom [_because no one suspects a teacher, do they?_].  
  
You don't know what you to tell her.  
  
You don't know how you to tell her that you love her without betraying everything.  
  
You don't know how you to tell her how close her death came to killing you.  
  
You don't know how you to tell her that you love her more than life itself, more than anything, more than the air that you breathe.  
  
They're just clichés, but anyone who's ever been in love will agree that they are true.  
  
But she means so much more to you than words can ever say, than clichés could ever express.  
  
All you want to be able to do is show her how much you love her, with your lips and your tongue and your fingers and your legs and every other part of you.  
  
But you can't.  
  
And that kills you every day.  
  
[_And I'm dyin' inside to leave you with more than just cliches._]  
  
*  
Your life is real.  
  
This life is real.  
  
When you touch something, it is solid.  
  
When you say something, words emerge and sounds are heard.  
  
When you do something, there are consequences of your actions.  
  
It is real in every single way except one.  
  
_Her._  
  
Because at some point in the last four years, you realised that your life was empty without her, without her loving you and you loving her.  
  
Your life isn't real.  
  
This isn't real.  
  
Because it doesn't involve her.  
  
But you can't do anything about it, just fight and fight and keep lying and keep deceiving everyone about everything until it all goes away and you're free to be with her again.  
  
So you will keep trying to tell yourself that your life is real, even though it feels like a bad dream, even though it's closer to a personal hell than real life.  
  
_This is real.  
  
This   
Is  
Real._  
  
It's a lie, but then again, so is everything in your life these days.  
  
Except for her. And your love for her. But then again, she's always been real to you.  
  
Sometimes too real.  
  
[_But tell them it's real. Tell them it's really real._]  
  
*  
  
You're closer to the end with every day.  
  
Or so you tell yourself every night, ticking off each day on an invisible calendar.  
  
It helps you feel like you're accomplishing something, like what you're doing really matters.  
  
Even though you know that most days are spent 'consolidating your cover', playing innocent, being the good CIA agent turned college French teacher turned CIA agent again, being the supportive husband as your wife complains about her, even though it's all you can do not to slap her sometimes.  
  
You're just so tired.  
  
So tired of it all.  
  
The lies, the wife, the betrayal, the treachery, the deceit….you don't know how she lived with it for so long.  
  
You're losing it again, you know.  
  
It's only so long you can keep it up much longer before things become too obvious.  
  
Before your cover begins to slip, before your eyes begin to betray you, before everything comes undone.  
  
Before your love for her refuses to stay hidden any longer.   
  
Before you give into the temptation that you have to fight so fiercely every time you see her.  
  
Before you kiss her once, twice, a thousand times and refuse to let her go again, mission be damned.  
  
It would be the end of you.  
  
It would be the end of the mission.  
  
It would be the final nail in your coffin.  
  
It would mean that it would all have been for nil, the pain, the lies, the heartbreak, the betrayal.  
  
And you don't think you could live with that, knowing that if you had just been a little bit stronger you could have made it work for a little bit longer.  
  
*  
  
You don't like what you're doing.  
  
But you do it anyway.  
  
And you just hope that she appreciates the sacrifices that you've made.  
  
Because you're not making them for yourself.  
  
*  
  
You once counted up all the times you'd nearly died trying to save her.  
  
And you lost count.  
  
But somehow you think that dying for her would be insignificant compared to this.  
  
Because death would be easy.  
  
Death would be quick.  
  
This is neither.  
  
This is heartbreak.  
  
This is lies and this is lying.  
  
This is sacrifice.  
  
This is betrayal.  
  
This is pain.  
  
This is your way of saying "I love you."  
  
And all you can do at this stage of the game is just hope that she can still hear you.  
  
[_I just don't have much left to say.  
They've taken their toll these latter days.  
They've taken their toll these latter days._]  
  
  
*  
  
_finis_  
  
  
In case you're interested, here's the lyrics to the song in full:  
  
_Latter Days_, **Over the ****Rhine**  
_What a beautiful piece of heartache this has all turned out to be.  
Lord knows we've learned the hard way all about healthy apathy.  
And I use these words pretty loosely.  
There's so much more to life than words.  
  
There is a me you would not recognize, dear. Call it the shadow of myself.  
And if the music starts before I get there dance without me. You dance so gracefully.  
I really think I'll be o.k. They've taken their toll these latter days.  
  
Nothin' like sleepin' on a bed of nails. Nothin' much here but our broken dreams.  
Ah, but baby if all else fails, nothin' is ever quite what it seems.  
And I'm dyin' inside to leave you with more than just cliches.  
  
There is a me you would not recognize, dear. Call it the shadow of myself.  
And if the music starts before I get there dance without me. You dance so gracefully.  
I really think I'll be o.k. They've taken their toll these latter days.  
  
But tell them it's real. Tell them it's really real.  
I just don't have much left to say.  
They've taken their toll these latter days.  
They've taken their toll these latter days._  
  
  
Anyway, you know how much I love reviews of all kinds [but particularly those with quotes], and I'd just like to express my sincere appreciation to everyone who reviewed "Pretense", I promise that it'll be updated soon.   
  
  
Em 


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